Is it time to throw out the creative director and rely on big data to predict what consumers want to wear next? Assistant Professor Ayelet Israeli discusses how Gap CEO Art Peck considers this bold idea to boost sales.
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New research on leading change from Harvard Business School faculty on issues including holacracy as a management structure, how to effect change rather than accept it, and case studies about prominent innovators in the business world.

Ryan Raffaelli set out to discover how independent bookstores managed to survive and even thrive in spite of competition from Amazon and other online retailers. His initial findings reveal how much consumers still value community and personal contact.
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Every successful social movement requires three distinct leadership roles: the agitator, the innovator, and the orchestrator, according to institutional change expert Julie Battilana.
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Courageous leaders inspire employees, energize customers, and position their companies on the front lines of societal change. Bill George explains why there aren't more of them.
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SUMMING UP When and where will holacracy, also known as self-management, work best? James Heskett's readers are conflicted as they respond to Zappos.com's radical adoption of the less-is-more management structure. What do YOU think?
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Harvard Business School students make an annual trek to businesses in the Japanese area wrecked by the 2011 earthquake and tsunami. Their objectives: learn all they can about human resilience and share their own management knowledge.
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In the fast-paced modern economy, businesses can no longer rely on just one organizational design, argues John Kotter in a new book, Accelerate: Building Strategic Agility for a Faster-Moving World. Why we need two "operating systems." PLUS Book excerpt.
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Management and leadership are not the same thing. But which is more important to a growing, innovative organization? An excerpt from John Kotter's new book, Accelerate: Building Strategic Agility for a Faster-Moving World.
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Every once in a while, an old technology rises from the ashes and finds new life. Ryan Raffaelli explains how the Swiss watch industry saved itself by reinventing its identity.
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The proposed marriage between American Airlines and US Airways would create the nation's largest airline. Professors Rosabeth Moss Kanter and Stuart Gilson reflect on a megamerger.
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In her new Harvard Business School course, Creative High-Impact Ventures: Entrepreneurs Who Changed the World, professor Mukti Khaire looks at ways managers can team with creative talent in six "culture industries": publishing, fashion, art-design, film, music, and food.
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For almost three decades, Sir Alex Ferguson has developed the Manchester United soccer club into one of the most recognized sports brands in the world. Professor Anita Elberse discusses the keys to Sir Alex's long-time success.
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In their new book, Producing Prosperity: Why America Needs a Manufacturing Renaissance, Harvard Business School professors Gary P. Pisano and Willy C. Shih discuss the dangers of underinvesting in the nation's manufacturing capabilities. This excerpt discusses the importance of the "industrial commons."
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In his new business fable, I Moved Your Cheese, Professor Deepak Malhotra challenges the idea that change is simply something we must anticipate, tolerate, and accept. Instead, the book teaches readers that success often lies in first questioning changes in the workplace and, if necessary, in effecting new changes ourselves. Q&A plus book excerpt.
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CEOs are often innovation cheerleaders, hoping that new ventures will eventually help reshape the industry for the better. But in tough economic times, the other senior company executives often choose to ignore innovative ventures and focus instead on the traditional core business, which reliably generate cash flow. This leads to a situation in which the CEO turns into more of a broker than a leader—trying to negotiate deals between the heads of the core units and the new units. That's a recipe for failure, according to Michael L. Tushman, Wendy K. Smith, and Andy Binns, who argue that firms can thrive only if the whole senior management team can embrace the tensions between the new and the old. In this paper, they introduce three guiding principles to help executives grow their core businesses while still nurturing their new ones. Key concepts include: Principle 1: Develop an overarching identity. The corporate identity should be broad enough to inspire both the core as well as the nascent business. Principle 2: Hold tension at the top. Innovation business units should report to the top management team. The strategic battles about old versus new businesses should be fought at the top of the corporate food chain. Principle 3: Embrace inconsistency. The senior management team needs to recognize that innovative and core businesses require very different, often inconsistent operating modes and measures of success. Still, the company must make a point of leveraging resources that are common between the new and older businesses.
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How do you transform a 123-year-old cultural icon and prepare it for the digital world? Slowly, as a new case on the "National Geographic Society" by David Garvin demonstrates.
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At a panel discussion on entrepreneurship, professor William A. Sahlman and several successful start-up veterans discussed the case of John Osher, father of Dr. John's Products, Ltd., and the wildly popular battery-powered toothbrush, the SpinBrush. Key concepts include: Look for gaps in the existing market or product lines to exploit. Anticipate product knockoffs and plan accordingly. Raise money when you don't need it, so you'll have it when you do. Be quick to market with the initial product and improve as you go along.
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